


I'll be your friend in the daylight again

by coffeeandchemicals



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Ableist Language, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Billy Hargrove Needs a Hug, Character Study, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Neil Hargrove's A+ Parenting, Pining, Season/Series 02, Steve Harrington Needs a Hug, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:15:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26777983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coffeeandchemicals/pseuds/coffeeandchemicals
Summary: Steve whispers, “She said I was bullshit.”“Who did?” Billy asks. He’s got his cigarette pack out and is bouncing it on his knee. Steve thinks it’s an unconscious, maybe even nervous movement.“Nancy. She said that we were just pretending. That she was only pretending to love me. But I wasn’t pretending. I didn’t know I was supposed to,” Steve mutters. He can feel the lump forming in his throat and he tries to swallow it down. It won’t move. It’s stuck there. “Was I supposed to?” he asks, his tone a little high, as he looks Billy in the eyes.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington
Comments: 24
Kudos: 348





	I'll be your friend in the daylight again

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nervoussis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nervoussis/gifts).



> Written for the extremely talented [nervoussis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nervoussis/pseuds/nervoussis), who gave me the prompt: the first time they share a cigarette. So I wrote this, which was supposed to be fluff, but… became mostly angst. 
> 
> Please mind the tags! If I’ve missed something, please let me know.
> 
> Beta'd by the wonderfully patient [red_plaid_on_red_plaid](https://archiveofourown.org/users/red_plaid_on_red_plaid) (who holds my hand sometimes and puts up with my extreme need for validation that my works are okay to post).

_Like we’re in love_

The room is spinning. Every time he closes his eyes, he can feel it shift underneath him. Every time he opens his eyes, it snaps into focus and then out of focus around him. As if his eyes are moving too quickly for his brain to catch up. Or maybe they’re not moving fast enough.

_You’re bullshit_

The room is weird. Who has such big plants — plants? No, trees — who has trees in a room? And the ceiling? Why is it all black? 

Oh. 

Wait. He isn’t in a room. He’s outside. How did that happen?

_You’re pretending like — like everything is okay_

Steve leans against the wall and sees that he is sitting on the ground, legs splayed out in front of him. He doesn’t remember how he got here. He remembers leaving after Nancy — 

_You don’t love me?_

— he and Nancy had talked. After she said those _things_ to him. After… But he’d felt guilty for abandoning her, even though she’d said —

_Like we’re in love_

— well, it didn’t matter what she’d said. So, he’d come back to the stupid party in his stupid costume with his stupid sunglasses and his stupid naïve gullible self hoping that she’d say sorry and that she did love him. 

That she wasn’t pretending. 

Steve couldn’t find her. Nancy had left. Tommy had handed him a mostly full bottle of Jack and told him that she had gone with Jonathan. 

(Actually, Tommy had slurred, “Can’t even hold onto your girl? She left with that freak, Byers. You’re really losing it, Harrington,” and then he’d laughed. Steve drew his own conclusions and white-knuckled the bottle, so he didn’t punch Tommy in the face.)

Steve had pushed Tommy off him and wandered from room to room,

_You don’t love me?_

drinking the alcohol like it was water, trying to put some space between himself and the version of Steve that was still in that bathroom, the version that was continually getting his heart broken, the version that was hearing _like we’re in love_ over and over, ad infinitum.

And, somehow, he’d ended up here, hands loosely around the neck of the now mostly empty bottle of whisky, staring at the stars as they swam in and out of focus, head tipped back against the brick wall. 

Steve lets his eyelids close, they’re so heavy. He thinks he falls asleep for a few minutes, because when he opens his eyes again, his head has slipped forward, chin on his chest. Steve’s hands have gone numb and he wonders if he should go inside. He wonders if it’s cold enough for him to freeze to death. He wonders, in his drunken dissociated state, if that would really matter. 

_It’s bullshit_

Steve manages to get his cold hands working enough to bring the bottle to his lips and he takes a sip, enjoying the way the alcohol burns all the way down his throat, enjoying the way the heat radiates outward to his extremities, enjoying that the alcohol will help him keep him numb just a little longer — that Nancy’s words will be dulled for a bit as they cycle around his brain. 

_You’re bullshit_

He drums his fingers on the bottle as he continues to look at the stars that keep blinking in and out of existence. He makes to stand but ends up leaning too far forward on his hand, falls over, and loses his bottle. Steve laughs. 

And laughs.

And then starts to cry. 

He can feel the tears gathering in the corners of his eyes as he lets his face settle on the concrete of the sidewalk. The sunglasses dig into the side of his face and he yanks them off and throws them away. The world slips out of focus. The music emanating from the house morphs into indistinguishable noise, its words and melody combining with the chatter of dozens of teens creating meaningless sound. These teens who haven’t just been dumped. These teens who didn’t have to face the reality that their reality wasn’t the only reality. These teens who didn’t carry around the guilt of getting someone killed and then lying to that person’s parents on a weekly basis. These teens who didn’t have dreams filled with monsters whose faces opened like flowers. These teens who didn’t know what it felt like to swing a nail-studded bat into said monsters and wrench it free. These teens who could go on being teens — worried about boys and girls liking them, their grades, if they’d be invited to the next party, if their parents were going to get a divorce — the usual stuff. Stuff that Steve used to worry about before that night at the Byers’. Stuff that Steve wishes he could worry about. 

But not anymore. Steve worries about dying and everyone else dying. Steve worries about monsters and things that go bump in the night.

He hears footsteps coming somewhat unsteadily up the concrete slabs. He hears them stop and the creak of leather and a scraping sound. 

“Got your shades,” a male voice drawls from right above Steve. 

Steve struggles to roll over, but eventually finds himself flat on his back, taking deep breaths and closing his eyes to force the bile down. When Steve opens his eyes again, Billy is crouched next to him, arms draped over his knees, Steve’s sunglasses dangling loosely in one hand, bottle of beer in the other. Steve groans and turns his head to face away from him. He does not want to deal with Billy. A pissing contest over who gets to rule the high school is just something he does not have the energy for. Steve doesn’t care. Not in the slightest.

Billy laughs and sets his beer down. Steve hears the glass of the bottle tinging off the concrete. He turns back to Billy and cracks open an eye. The world shifts as it tries to catch up to Steve’s movements. Billy is grinning down at him, then he puts Steve’s shades on, and stands.

“Come on, man,” Billy says, and sticks out his hand.

Steve stares at it, dully, gaze losing focus, doubling Billy’s hand as it hangs in the air above him.

“Get up,” Billy says, his tone taking on a harder edge, as if he’s losing patience with Steve. 

_You’re bullshit_

“Go away,” Steve slurs, flopping his hand in a shooing gesture that fails to deliver its meaning as he doesn’t have the energy for the follow through. Instead, his hand just succumbs to gravity and thumps back on the sidewalk.

“C’mon, Harrington,” Billy says again, but he’s already dropped back down and wedged one of his hands under Steve’s shoulder. 

Steve is too tired to fight Billy. Steve is too tired to help Billy. So, he just lets Billy manhandle him into a sitting position. Then Billy grabs both of Steve’s wrists in an iron-grip — the pain briefly brings Steve back to himself — and hauls Steve to his feet. Steve sways and stumbles, but Billy has ducked under Steve’s arm and thrown his arm around Steve’s waist. Steve collapses into Billy and focuses on trying to pick up his feet in a motion that mimics walking but manifests itself in a stumbling gait the leaves the pair weaving around the yard in an effort to get to the house’s backdoor. 

Steve stops them near some bushes and retches. Billy sighs at this and Steve turns to see him push the sunglasses onto the top of his head.

“You weren’t like this earlier,” Billy remarks, as he fishes around in his jacket pocket, still holding Steve up by the waist.

“No shit,” Steve mutters, standing and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He glares at Billy, who just levels a cool stare back at him.

“It’s no fun being king when there’s no competition,” Billy says, around the cigarette that he’s just put in his mouth.

Steve continues to glower at him. “It doesn’t matter, you know that, right?”

“What? Bein’ king?”

“Yeah.”

“Makes life easier, don’t it?” Billy asks, as he maneuvers Steve into a lawn chair. He plops down in the one next to Steve and stretches out his legs. “All those plebs worshipping you?”

“Plebs?” Steve’s eyes alight on the group around the keg — teens laughing, yelling, fighting, secure in their own narcissistic little worlds.

_Like we’re in love_

“It’s all bullshit,” Steve whispers.

_You don’t love me?_

“Uh-huh,” Billy agrees, then he takes a drag on his cigarette, the tip glows orange in the darkness. “But,” he adds, and exhales a cloud of smoke with his words, “life is bullshit.” The smoke and his words dissipate slowly.

“You’re a ball of fucking sunshine,” Steve says, eyes moving from the group by the keg to Billy’s face. He is mesmerized as Billy takes another drag. The light from the house casts shadows, making the planes of Billy’s face sharper, making glints appear in Billy’s eyes, making Billy’s lips around the cigarette shine wetly. Steve swallows. He feels raw and exposed. 

Billy quirks an eyebrow.

Steve licks his lips.

Billy snorts and drops his gaze. “You’re welcome to leave whenever you want, pretty boy, I’m not hurtin’ for company.”

_You’re pretending like — like everything is okay_

“No,” Steve mutters, “I don’t wanna go back there.”

“King Steve doesn’t want to mingle with his adoring subjects?”

“Aren’t they _your_ adoring subjects now?”

“I don’t want ‘em,” Billy says, voice low and gravely, “not really.” He pauses and then adds, almost as an afterthought, “Good cover though.”

What does Billy mean by that? Steve looks at him; Billy’s staring at the group around the keg with disgust — and… fear? — written across his face. Steve swallows and says, as nonchalantly as he can while being this drunk, “Neither do I.”

Billy laughs, it’s cold and derisive, and asks, sarcastically, “What? Being king not all it’s cracked up to be?”

“It’s just bullshit,” Steve repeats. “If they knew half the stuff” — monsters, labs, shady government agencies, all the killing, all the death, all the fear — “that goes on in this town.”

“Like what?” Billy asks, as he leans over to stub out the cigarette on the ground at his feet. 

“Weird shit,” Steve says, but his voice sounds like it’s coming from the end of a tunnel. He lets his head loll forward and closes his eyes. 

_Like we’re in love_

“What kinda weird shit?” asks Billy. Steve can hear him rummaging around in his coat again, tapping out another cigarette into his palm, and the flick-flick of a lighter. 

“Stuff you don’t wanna know about,” Steve slurs. He opens his eyes to drive home that point, but the lights from the house leave trails in his vision as they move too slowly and too quickly into focus. Steve leans over and his stomach heaves. 

“Really, Harrington?” Billy asks, exasperated, “shouldn’t you know your limit by now?”

Steve just groans and sees Billy’s boots weave away towards the house as he continues to stare at the ground. Great. He’s alone again. Not that he wanted Billy’s company. Not at all. 

_You’re bullshit_

But it had been nice not being alone in his own head. 

He sits back up, moving slowly to keep the dizziness at bay. Serves him right, Steve thinks, drinking out of spite. It’s not like he wanted Billy’s approval anyways. He slumps down in the chair and closes his eyes. And lets himself drift. 

“Harrington!” a voice says, and Steve jerks open his eyes. 

“Wha—,” Steve mutters, squinting up at… Billy. Billy’s back. Billy’s looking at him with this concerned? — concerned — expression on his face. 

“Drink this,” Billy orders, and shoves a plastic cup into Steve’s chest. 

Steve automatically grabs it before Billy can drop it to spill all over him. Their fingers brush together and Billy’s are _so_ warm. Or, maybe, Steve’s are just really cold. 

“Billy,” Steve says, surprised at how whiny his tone is, “I don’t wanna drink more.”

“It’s water, you idiot,” Billy says, rolling his eyes, “drink it.”

Steve sips some, shivers, and feels his stomach roll. “Ugh,” he mutters. But he takes a few more sips with Billy looming over him, cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth. 

“C’mon.” Billy sticks out his hand, Steve grabs it, and Billy pulls him to his feet. Steve sways, but Billy’s got both his hands wrapped around Steve’s upper arms to hold him steady. 

“Where are we goin’?” Steve asks, as Billy leads him back to the house. 

“Some place warm.” Then Billy adds, with a wry smile thrown over his shoulder, “Where you won’t freeze if you pass out.”

They end up collapsing on a couch in the basement. It’s late enough that many people have taken off for the night and the room is mostly empty. Billy leans over and pulls the ashtray on the coffee table closer him. He stubs out his cigarette.

Steve leans his head back to rest on the back of the couch. He stares at the ceiling, seeing water stains and shadows created by the popcorn finish that move when he blinks. Finally, when the words won’t leave him alone, Steve whispers, “She said I was bullshit.”

“Who did?” Billy asks. He’s got his cigarette pack out and is bouncing it on his knee. Steve thinks it’s an unconscious, maybe even nervous movement. 

“Nancy. She said that we were just pretending. That she was only pretending to love me. But I wasn’t pretending. I didn’t know I was supposed to,” Steve mutters. He can feel the lump forming in his throat and he tries to swallow it down. It won’t move. It’s stuck there. “Was I supposed to?” he asks, his tone a little high, as he looks Billy in the eyes. 

“No,” Billy says, voice sincere — something Steve wasn’t expecting, even in his drunken state — then Billy adds, “if you love someone, love them. Don’t pretend to feel something that isn’t there. Or, pretend to not feel something that is.” He taps out a cigarette and Steve catches the brand on the package — Marlboro Reds — but Billy doesn’t light it. 

“After what we went through,” Steve says, leaning forward, resting his elbows on his knees, and chin in his hands, “I thought this was it. She was the one.” And… leaning forward probably wasn’t the greatest idea. Steve slowly eases back. He lets his head fall back on the back of the couch, only it’s not the couch, but Billy’s arm resting along the back, encased in worn leather that’s unbearably soft. Steve doesn’t move, but he waits for Billy to yell at him or jerk his arm away. 

Billy doesn’t do either.

“What’d you go through?” Billy asks. Then he puts the cigarette in his mouth and grabs his lighter out of his pocket.

“Monsters,” Steve says, before his brain can stop himself. “Don’t go in the woods.”

“Are there monsters there?” Billy lights his cigarette and when Steve turns his head to look at him, their eyes meet. 

“Yes,” Steve whispers. Billy’s eyes are dark pools in the dim lights of the room.

Billy snorts. “Know a thing or two ‘bout monsters,” he says, as he exhales the smoke. “Doubt yours are any scarier than mine.”

“Mine are real,” Steve states. 

Billy looks unconvinced. 

“Please,” Steve says, his voice taking on a pleading tone, “Billy, just don’t go in the woods. In fact, get outta town. This place is going to destroy everything.”

“It’s a good thing that I don’t care about anything, then,” Billy says. Then he holds out his cigarette to Steve. “You look like you could use this.”

Steve stares at the cigarette and then Billy’s face and then the cigarette again. His drunk brain wondering if Billy knows that two guys shouldn’t share cigarettes. When he looks back at Billy’s face, he’s got his head tipped back, making his eyes half-lidded and this smirk that is just daring Steve to say something. Steve’s too drunk to care. And he wants Billy to keep looking at him like that, like —

_You’re bullshit_

— Steve matters. He grabs the cigarette and inhales. The smoke is hot in his mouth; the hit of nicotine gives him a little buzz. The world spins again as Steve leans back against Billy’s arm, which he still hasn’t moved. “Thanks,” Steve says, and holds the cigarette out to Billy.

Billy maintains eye contact as he leans down and puts his lips around the cigarette _while Steve is holding it_. Well, Steve doesn’t know what to do with this… whatever this is. So, he just watches, heart thudding, world swimming, and waits. 

Billy moves back and exhales the smoke in a deliberate stream. “Monsters aside, Nancy seems to have done a number on you.”

Steve doesn’t know what to say this, so he takes a drag on the cigarette. 

“But don’t think that I’m not gonna ask you about those when you sober up,” Billy continues. “Maybe we’ll compare notes, see who knows the worst monster.”

Steve shudders, hoping that he’s drunk enough that he’ll forget letting this secret slip to Billy Hargrove, of all people. “I dunno, I’m not supposed to talk about it.”

“I can keep a secret,” Billy says, in a level tone, face blank. Then, as Steve hands him the cigarette, he adds, “You can trust me.”

“No offense, man,” Steve says, “I would trust you about as far as I can throw you, which would not be far given your whole…” Steve gestures to Billy’s bare torso. 

“I dunno,” Billy says, tone teasing, “I’d let you throw me as far as you want.” Then he winks. And… Steve really doesn’t know what to do with _that_. 

“Uhhhh… I don’t even know what we’re talkin’ about anymore,” Steve mutters. 

“Don’ worry about it,” Billy whispers, and he passes Steve the cigarette again. “We’ll talk later. When you got all your faculties.”

Steve’s the one who raises his eyebrow. Sure, he’s drunk, but he hasn’t made a fool of himself yet. Has he? He inhales, holding Billy’s stare. There’s something there that Steve isn’t picking up on. Something he can’t quite put his finger on. Billy’s telling him something that he isn’t actually saying. And Steve just can’t figure it out.

_You’re pretending like — like everything is okay_

Billy laughs. “Don't think on it too hard, man. Pretty boy like you doesn't have anything to worry about.” But he sounds sad when he says the last part. Like he wants Steve to worry about something. Or he wishes he didn’t have things to worry about. 

Steve thinks back on their conversation, which is really difficult, considering his brain is underwater. He thinks of Nancy saying that they’re pretending everything is okay. He thinks of Billy saying things about covers and monsters and his looks of fear and disgust. And…

“You can trust me,” Steve blurts out. Then he adds after a breath, “I’m not a bad guy, you know? I said it’s all bullshit and I meant it. High school, pretending, fitting in, it’s all bullshit.”

Billy doesn’t respond, but his eyes grow big and dart back and forth. And Steve knows this expression. He’s seen it on his own face in the mirror, seen it on Nancy’s and Jonathan’s and every one of those kids’ faces – fear, terror, an animal that’s been caught and looking for an escape. 

Steve wraps his hand around Billy’s wrist as he passes the cigarette — it’s almost done — back to him. He hopes it’s a reassuring gesture. He really does, but he doesn’t have much experience filling this role. “It’s okay, man. I’m drunk, remember? If you want me to forget, I will. The world is too messed up a place and I’m trying to not add to it.”

Billy relaxes slightly, takes the cigarette, inhales, and then stubs it out into the overflowing ashtray. Then he says into the dark of the room, “You tell me about your monsters, and I’ll tell you about mine.”

Steve nods, and says, “Okay,” because he isn’t sure if Billy saw him. Then he lets his head settle back on Billy’s arm and closes his eyes. 

_You don’t love me?_

Billy’s gone when Steve jerks awake hours later. Steve assumes it’s been hours because the sun is streaming in through the small windows and lighting up his face. He groans. His head is pounding and his mouth tastes sour. Steve sits up and a small pillow falls onto the couch beside him. Someone — maybe Billy? He hopes it was Billy — put the pillow under his head while he slept. He remembers everything. It’s hazy and dreamlike. But it’s there. 

And Steve lets himself think about Billy and wonder if his assumptions were right.

* * *

“Harrington,” a voice calls out. It’s the evening on the day following the party and Steve’s still wearing sunglasses to fight the hangover. He looks up and sees Billy leaning against his Camaro, smoking, he looks a little nervous — a little scared. Steve slowly walks over, wondering how they’re going to interact with each other without alcohol to lower the gates and let the words flow. 

Steve stops in front of Billy, lifts his shades, and slowly grabs the cigarette from Billy’s hand. Steve looks at the bruise that’s forming below Billy’s right eye, shades of blue and purple bleeding through the remainder of Billy’s tan. Steve sees the split lip, puffy and red. Steve sees the dark circles under Billy’s eyes. He sees all of these things and catalogues them for later, when they’ve talked, when Billy trusts him enough to let him in. 

Steve takes a drag on the cigarette and holds it out. 

Billy takes it and says, “We gonna talk ‘bout monsters?”

**Author's Note:**

> The title is from [Salt and The Sea](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrlYnowqPWg&ab_channel=LumineersVEVO) by The Lumineers. 
> 
> I took Nancy's dialogue from episode 2 of season 2 (if that wasn't obvious...). One of Billy's lines has been adapted from the shower scene. 
> 
> Any comments or kudos are greatly appreciated. 
> 
> I'm on tumblr! You can find me @ [coffeeandchemicals](https://coffeeandchemicals.tumblr.com/). Send me prompts!!! The writer’s block is pretty bad right now.


End file.
